With China’s People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) fielding a sizeable inventory of conventionally armed BMs in Tibet, the Indian Army (IA) wants to deploy symmetric counters to the same.

At the moment, the only means for the IA to strike targets at distances of close to 500 km is the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile (CM), which though deadly accurate, can carry a payload of only about 200 kg or so, besides being somewhat expensive.

As such, the IA in recent times has felt the need for a SRBM with a range of around 500 km that can also carry a sizeable payload. It is to address this requirement that the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is currently developing a new conventional strike surface to surface missile (SSM) called the Pralay. Read More